04/19/24
March 12, 2006
The NCAA Tourney Field Is Set: And now all I have to do is enter 2 tournament pools and fill out my hard copy bracket. This year looks entertaining for sure.
posted by chemwizBsquared to basketball at 11:17 PM - 20 comments
I was hoping Littlepage was going to be forthcoming about the choice of Air Force and the inclusion of four Missouri Valley teams (all seeded below six). Unfortunately, he was no different than other selection heads, just blathering on about how careful the selection was, and they thought the teams were really good. Jim Nantz and Billy Packer were loaded for bear with stats, and kept throwing Littlepage's own words back in his face. Good for them.
posted by L.N. Smithee at 02:19 AM on March 13, 2006
Air Force has no reason to be their over Cincinnati.
posted by mick at 09:29 AM on March 13, 2006
to be wheir?
posted by everett at 10:23 AM on March 13, 2006
good one everett, subtle, but good.
posted by bobrolloff at 11:13 AM on March 13, 2006
I like Arkansas through 3 rounds, and UCONN's toughest game will be UAB. Tennessee should lose early. I could see LSU ruining Duke's dreams, and I like Gonzaga to at least the Final Four. In other words, I THINK UCONN defeats Gonzaga by 8 in the Championship.
posted by Snikastyle at 01:51 PM on March 13, 2006
Missouri State got jobbed. Packer is a bigger asshole each year.
posted by sirvomitousIV at 01:51 PM on March 13, 2006
I'm a Gonzaga homer and, although I think they have a favorable bracket, I don't see them getting past Memphis, who has beaten them once already this year. Championship game should be U-Conn beating Duke. Zags might make the elite eight. Maybe. I hope.
posted by THX-1138 at 02:26 PM on March 13, 2006
I have good feelings about the Jayhawks for the first 3 rounds but Pitt may be the tester. Puh-lease sweet Jesus- Anything but last year's repeat!
posted by 1651 Naismith at 02:26 PM on March 13, 2006
The Washington Post has a cool Tourney Tracker that will rate your bracket picks against other people's. When you make your picks, it tells you (I think) the percentage of other people who made the same pick. The Monmouth-Hampton winner gets no love, with 0% picking them against Villanova. Other brackets: CBS SportsLine, ESPN, MSNBC, NCAA, Sports Illustrated, and Yahoo!.
posted by kirkaracha at 02:42 PM on March 13, 2006
I want to know how Alabama got in & Hofstra was left out?
posted by usroute17 at 03:36 PM on March 13, 2006
How did George Mason get in and Hofstra was left out? How did Air Force get in and Cincinnati or Florida State get left out?
posted by bperk at 03:54 PM on March 13, 2006
I definitely think Cincinnati and Michigan got robbed. Teams like Utah State, Air Force, and UAB who beat absolutely no one out of conference definitely shouldn't have gotten at large bids ahead of Cin and Mich. The only thing UAB had for them was an in conference home win over Memphis. And what about other one win wonders, like Florida St. and Texas A&M? Sure the wins over Duke and Texas respectively look nice on their resume, but they have got to go out and not only play quality teams out of conference, but beat them as well. At least teams like Memphis and Gonzaga, who play in weak conferences, go out and play good, quality non-conference opponents and they usually do well against them.
posted by headgames at 04:56 PM on March 13, 2006
Link to the Sports Filter tournament pickem. Headgames Michigan did not deserve to be their. They had their chance to win against Indiana and a bad Minnesota team and choked. They also didn't help themselves by losing five of their last seven games. And that is coming from a die hard Michigan fan
posted by Ying Yang Mafia at 05:20 PM on March 13, 2006
The thing that is most scandalous to me is the seeding of UCLA (2nd seed, 7th/8th in the polls, #13 RPI ranking) in the West Regional over Gonzaga (3rd seed, 5th in the polls with one #1 vote this week, #10 RPI Ranking). What's up with THAT?!!
posted by L.N. Smithee at 05:34 PM on March 13, 2006
My guess would be that Gonzaga barely scraped by their conference schedule. Yes they did win all the games, but they should have blown away the other teams as the WCC is weak. The PAC 10 is so much stronger; Gonzaga should have had a higher margin of victory thru-out and not have stumbled as much in the conference tourny.
posted by THX-1138 at 07:43 PM on March 13, 2006
Well if we can complain about teams not making it, then what about UTEP or UH (my school)? Both have solid cases. C-USA wasn't as bad this year as everyone made it out to be. UH played pretty well this season (knocking off Arizona and LSU while both were ranked and giving Memphis ALL they could handle twice in the span of a week). Oh well, NIT bound this year for my Cougars...we'll see how they fare there.....
posted by chemwizBsquared at 11:36 PM on March 13, 2006
Heck, let's just do away with the conference tournaments altogether and add another weekend of NCAA tourney, double to field to 128 and if you are a bubble team at that time, then do you really have a case to argue??? Or better yet, cut one week of non-conference from the start of the year, and make it nearly an all-comers field of 256...
posted by elovrich at 12:30 AM on March 14, 2006
How did George Mason get in and Hofstra was left out?
'Cause George Mason rules! /alum /doesn't actually care
posted by kirkaracha at 01:01 PM on March 14, 2006
Well, if expanded the field to 128 then you'd have some under .500 squads in the field of play, and you'd also have teams 129-130's complaining too...either way, there WILL be complaints about this system... This is why we have the NIT...if you don't get into the NCAAs, then you have this "backup tournament" to go to...its mainly about the playing opportunity...right?
posted by chemwizBsquared at 05:13 PM on March 14, 2006
It looks like there are a lot of games that could go either way. Picking the winners isn't going to be easy. I do know one thing, don't listen to Digger Phelps.